


The Island of Misfit Ficlets

by sarcasm_for_free



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Canon Compliant, Crack, Drama, F/M, Ficlet Collection, Gen, Humor, Post-Canon, Romance, different styles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-08
Updated: 2018-12-17
Packaged: 2019-02-12 05:28:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 28
Words: 14,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12952320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarcasm_for_free/pseuds/sarcasm_for_free
Summary: 80% Braime, 20% whoever tickles my fancy that week. (I think we can stop pretending that this isn't a J/B collection.)Chapter 28: A thousand words wouldn’t be enough to describe Brienne…





	1. Beyond Repair [Daenerys, Brienne]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Daenerys meets the newest knight of the realm.
> 
> (Post Canon)

The laughter increased in volume as the one they called the Maid of Tarth walked through the hall to pay her respects before Daenerys’ hard won throne. The magnitude of it was staggering.

The new queen looked around her, noting the snickering faces, nasty whispers and pointing fingers. When the lady knight straightened from her perfectly executed bow, Daenerys stored all the little things about this giant of a woman away for further use – the steel in her gaze, the redness of her cheeks, the scars that marked her as a survivor. Raising her dainty hand, the girl known as the fairest queen of them all silenced her court with just one simple gesture.

For a few seconds she stared directly into the eyes of the newest knight of the realm without uttering a sound. Finally her voice rang out, strong and as haughty as can be, and it became clear that her words may be said to a stoic Lady Brienne, but they were meant to be heard by every single person in the room.

"Men see a beautiful lady and think her weak. They see a strong woman and think her ugly. Undoubtedly, the reasoning of men is flawed beyond repair.”


	2. Preschool, Day 1 [Gilly, someone's child]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gilly as a preschool teacher. (And _someone's_ child.)
> 
> (Modern AU)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally, I had planned to post a totally different ficlet today. But well...

_Tell us what your family does for fun_ was an unproblematic enough task, Gilly thought as she observed her new bunch of preschoolers.

“My mommy and daddy punch each other a lot, and I cheer them on. But mostly I cheer for mommy. When she wins, daddy puts silly hats on his stump and we eat ice cream for dinner. Chocolate with sprinkles! Then I have to go to bed and they punch each other a bit more in their room, so I can’t hear them. Daddy says that’s fun too because he wins whenever they are alone in there.”

Well. There was always that one child in every group.


	3. Silent Night [Brienne/Jaime, their families]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Christmas Eve at Braime’s house. _You ain’t seen nothing yet._
> 
> (Modern AU)

 

_Christmas is the time to come together._

_The time to bury hatchets, and to rejoice in love and understanding._

_It’s an opportunity to spend time with your family and loved ones._

_Christmas is the most peaceful of all seasons. And no matter what happened before, everything will be forgiven._

 

“The movie industry _lied_ to us,” Brienne mumbled aghast as if this fact was news to her.

Standing next to Jaime, she watched the events unfolding in her dining room in stunned horror.

On different ends of the table, Selwyn and Tywin were in the middle of a shouting match over whose child was not fit to be the spouse of the other’s heir while the heaps of food between them still smoked from being set on fire by Tyrion’s latest girlfriend, who apparently was a pyromaniac. Since she had been kindly asked to leave, Tyrion was in the corner, drunkenly trying to cajole Sansa with loud declarations of love under the mistletoe. But said girl’s mother was hell-bent on preventing that by threatening the dwarf with a pointy tree ornament. In the meantime the escaped Sansa was in a staring duel to the death with Cersei, who tried with her left hand to keep her daughter Myrcella from sexting her absentee boyfriend (news they all had learned because of his latest call that accidentally went on loudspeaker when Jaime was about to carve the turkey…and almost took his hand off in the process). With her right hand she was tugging on Tommen’s ankle to get the kid out from under the table, where he was feeding the kittens he had smuggled in. And since Joffrey wasn’t accustomed to not being the center of attention, he was needling Sansa, who stoically ignored him, with veiled comments about her love life. But that earned him Arya’s ire, which manifested in the girl discreetly pocketing the abandoned carving knife to stab him with it at the earliest opportunity.

“Last-minute tickets to Essos are pretty cheap on Christmas Eve,” Jaime told his wife without taking his eyes off the mayhem.

They grabbed their keys, wallets and phones from the sideboard in the hall as they fled their own home.

The moment they stepped into their car, the couple could hear a loud scream of “You little bitch!”, followed by an even greater tumult.

Seemed like Arya saw her chance and took it.

_Merry bloody Christmas._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is for everyone whose winter holidays are always far from perfect and quiet.  
> Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!


	4. Breaking the Ice [Tyrion&Brienne, J/B]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tyrion tries to entertain his soon-to-be good sister. She’s not one for small talk.
> 
> (Post Canon)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was, a long time ago, a little writing exercise for a longer project of mine. The multi-chapter fic is still not finished, but here, have this in the meantime.

As far as possible good sisters went, Brienne of Tarth was not the worst candidate Tyrion had seen his brother courting. To be fair, there was only one woman before the Amazon. But the statuesque giantess was definitely a better choice than his late sister. Less said about that one, the better.

The night was balmy, the wine was flowing and everyone had a merry old time. Except for his brother’s soon-to-be bride, who let her eyes flitter over everything in the ballroom like a hunted deer, either in search of Jaime or to find a way to get away from a drunken Tyrion. He bet on the latter, hence the panicked look.

“He’ll be back, don’t you worry.”

“I know.”

Everything he had tried to break the ice between them since Jaime sent him in the lady’s direction, so she wouldn’t have to mingle with the mean spirited nobles of King’s Landing until he could weasel out of his talk with aunt Genna, had backfired in the same fashion. She was a dour one.

He tipped his head as far back as it could go to get even the last drop of his Arbor gold and then just stayed in that position. For one thing, something had jammed in his neck. For another, the view up his companion was much more diverting this way, even though it wasn’t that far off from his usual position when talking to others.

From Brienne’s poorly braided hair and odd looking nose to the broadness of her shoulders stretching the last-minute made blue brocade dress to the extreme – she looked more imposing from this vantage point, which wasn’t such a feat when she wasn’t attired in something so ill fitting. That, or he was drunker than he thought. Probably both.

He swayed a bit as he let his eyes travel from her head to the hem of her too bushy gown, obviously considering something his drunken mind found most intriguing. Done with his inspection, he snatched a part of the blue material before him and worried it between his thumb and pointer finger.

“I could hide under the mass of your skirts for days and nobody would ever find me.”

The deer look vanished in an instant from her face.

“The same goes for your corpse after you tried that.”

Yes, he most definitely liked that one.

 


	5. Like Lancelot and Guinevere [J/B]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There is a song that lovelorn maidens adore…
> 
> (Book Canon Compliant)

There is a song that lovelorn maidens adore, that sends seasoned ladies into a frenzy of lust, and makes hardened crones swoon. It is a song about love, of course. And of the perils a man is willing to endure for the woman of his heart.

 _To save his chosen love_ , the villain of the story whispered, _the knight has to bring the uttermost sacrifice_. Forced to forgo his pride and do something to leave his dignity in shatters, he had to embrace shame to save his intended.

 _Shame_ was a concept Ser Jaime Lannister was intimately acquainted with. For deeds of the past, good and bad and worse, he still felt the lingering twinges upon his heart.

So when the time came to add another blemish to his soul, he just burned his sister’s letter and almost accomplished to forget about the voice in his mind susurrating what he _could have, would have, should have_ done.

Instead, he followed a maiden not lovelorn, seasoned or prone to swooning into the woods.

In possession of the knowledge that he was led astray, he followed her deeper and deeper into the depths of hell. Forsaking the last bit of pride he hadn’t been willing to let his sister annihilate through a shared fall from grace, he rode with a lady worthy of songs into a future of betrayal, horror and, above all, mockery. When old names would be thrown at him, new ones be acquired, and he would have to kneel in the dirt as the mob brayed for blood, would his dignity be a tale of the past.

Thus, before the thicket of the forest swallowed him whole, he grasped for every moment in which he had lost a part of his honor through his acts, and embraced them. He nestled them up to his chest, let them lead him.

There was a song about a knight shaming himself to save his courtly love, and therefore gain a far greater honor than the one he had lost.

It was not a song Ser Jaime Lannister fully understood.

But it was one he could live.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As some of you probably deduced from the title of this ficlet, the 'song' they talk about is Chrétien de Troyes' _Le Chevalier de la charrette_ , the story of how Lancelot had to ride on a cart like a prisoner to save Guinevere.
> 
> Happy New Year to all of you!


	6. Up and at 'em [Donyse, Mordane, kiddy!J/B]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Septa Donyse looks after her charges, even when it's actually Mordane's turn.
> 
> (Modern AU, kiddy!Braime)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why is it so easy to imagine Jaime and Brienne as parents or kids?

Septa Donyse arranged a few more red apples for the children’s afternoon snack on the tray. The clock over the play kitchen showed her she had only five minutes left before a horde of preschoolers would descend on her and demand to be read a story. The sweetlings were always so groggy when they had played outdoor games under Septa Mordane’s supervision. Throwing a look out of the window to see if they were already packing up the balls and other playthings, she noticed two bitty figures walking away from the other kids. The usual suspects: Jaime Lannister and Brienne Tarth.

Donyse tutted and mentally scolded Mordane for losing sight of these two, _again_. They never got hurt or anything like that, but it was the principle of it: _When you are working at a daycare facility, keep the children in view._ Well, she would just have to do it from here until the other septa noticed her mistake.

The little sneaks were wandering to the small hill at the back of the playground. It was more molehill than Dornish sandhills. Donyse squinted. Braime, that’s what the septas called the dynamic duo when they were in the mood to coo over their charges, were playing a most peculiar game, it seemed.

“Up, up, prisoner! We have to be over the mountains and through the rivers by midnight!” little not-so-little Brienne exclaimed with her sweet lisp, due to losing her first incisor. She was towing Jaime, who was caked with mud from play-wrestling Bronn half an hour ago, behind her with a hand on his ponytail as if it was a rope. He seemed grumpier about not getting to play the knight than about her pulling him along like a bad doggy on a leash.

Donyse took one of the extra apples left in her basket, because they were not pretty enough to be served, and bit into it. Wholly amused, she watched as Mordane finally recognized that two of her hellions had scuttled away from the herd. Chewing her fruit, Donyse just grinned when Mordane looked towards heaven and shouted, “If I wasn’t employed by the Gods, I would demand a raise!” before running after her two lost sheep.

Donyse couldn’t wait for the next task rotation. Playground-duty was so much more fun.


	7. Mommy is a Star [parents!J/B]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jaime likes to tell their daughter about Brienne’s heroics. Or something like that. 
> 
> (Modern AU, parents!Braime, cracky)

"And then your mother caught the flying samurai sword, barehanded!”

The little girl made the appropriate ‘Oh’ face, big eyes and fish mouth, absolutely captivated by the heroics of the woman who had birthed her.

“Yes, she saved those boys, but she lost her pinky in the process.”

The child threw a worried look at her mommy’s hands from her place on the couch. All of her mother’s fingers were currently involved in cutting carrots for dinner. They looked a bit whiter than usual as they gripped the knife’s handle hard upon hearing the story. But other than that, they looked like always. But maybe mama had one more finger, an extra one, before she was a mommy? Like daddy and his right hand?

“So, which story about your mother do you want to hear next?” her papa asked, a wide grin stretching his face. “The one in which she was working as a model for some time until she got a little scar on her cheek because a reading center for children collapsed on her? Or the one where she travelled back in time when she walked through the streets of Paris at night?”

She had a hard time deciding. Mommy had so many funny things happen to her in daddy’s stories.

“For all that’s good and holy, Jaime!” Her mama had her red face on. The one with the twitching eyelid, not the one with the crumpled brow. That meant she was angry. Someone wouldn’t get dessert tonight. She hoped it wasn’t her. It was apple pie day.

“Stop selling our daughter movie plots as the story of my life!” Before she resumed chopping vegetables, she whirled on daddy, shaking the knife at him.

“And I look nothing like Owen Wilson!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my way of working through my mind’s weird tendencies when reading the description ‘two times broken’ for Brienne’s nose. It is book canon, and some think Gwen’s nose looks funny. But every time I read this phrase my mind goes to Owen Wilson in the pink dress with fur lining…
> 
> Edit: After some really sweet comments, I decided to reveal the movies behind the references. All three are Owen Wilson movies:  
> "flying samurai sword" = Drillbit Taylor  
> "model + reading center for children" = Zoolander 1 & 2  
> "travelling back in time" = Midnight in Paris


	8. Everything or Nothing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pursued by wights, Jaime has an idea how he and Brienne could escape them, maybe. Brienne thinks he’s mad.
> 
> (Canon/Post Canon, prompt)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On Monday, I got tagged by [WeirdDaydreamingFangirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WeirdDaydreamingFangirl/pseuds/WeirdDaydreamingFangirl), after I was bemoaning the fact that I seem to be the only tumblr-less loser alive :P  
> So, it’s neither Friday nor exactly 500 words, but this is still for the Friday Fast Fic challenge and WeirdDaydreamingFangirl’s lovely prompt: _void_.
> 
> Thanks to [roqueamadi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/roqueamadi/pseuds/roqueamadi) for playing tense-checker ;)

"This is a horrible idea!“ Brienne screamed over the roaring of the horde of wights on their heels.

She and Ser Jaime had been surrounded by the creatures who had overrun the battlefield, and therefore they had been forced to retreat with the few other unscathed humans. The handful of struggling survivors had split up when they entered the Godswood, to give at least some of them a chance to escape.

Brienne wasn’t one to run away, and neither was Jaime, but the sheer mass of monsters left no possible way out for them. And now, after three quarters of the wights had decided to follow them instead of the others, they were doomed. She was ready to fall, clawing and biting if she had to since their swords had not withstood the onslaught in the end, in a last fight. At least she would die knowing her demise had maybe bought the remaining humans a bit more time.

As the two warriors had moved through the woods, or what was left of the now equally rotten and frozen vegetation, Jaime had began to tug her in a specific direction. His intentions were clear to her. They wouldn’t be to a sane person, but they both had left mentally stable territory a long time ago.

 _The bottomless pit_ , the people of Winterfell had called it. At the farthest end of the place, between two stone walls, was a hole dug into the ground. Nobody knew how it came to be or if the rumors were true, but whatever got thrown into it, it was said, never reached the bottom, for nobody ever heard it thud on the ground.

And the man who was fleeing with her from wights wanted to jump right into it.

“It’s rumored that if you go in there, you will get spat out on the other side of the world,” Jaime wheezed, his focus on the nearing pit.

Brienne could hear the undead coming closer, but there was no time to turn around. “That’s a story for children! Not a single person fell in and came back to tell the tale!” She stumbled and Jaime grabbed her upper arm to keep her from crashing down, insistently tugging her forward in their mad dash.

“But it’s our only chance to get out of here and not end up in pieces or with new flashy eyes and a deathly complexion!” he tried to drown out the unholy ruckus behind them.

Only a few meters to go before they reached the pit. _Why did it always have to be a pit?_

“But if there’s no end, and just an all compassing nothingness, or if there _is_ a bottom–“

“Then we’re dead.”

Five meters to go.

“One chance is better than no chance at all.”

Jaime held his left hand out to her, never slowing down. “Together?”

They were almost there.

She clasped his hand in hers without a second thought.

One meter.

“See you on the other side, wench,” he smiled at her and squeezed her fingers.

And they jumped into the great unknown.

 


	9. Not Like You Imagined

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone is feeling insecure after sex, and it’s not Brienne.
> 
> (Post Canon)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My first attempt at smut.  
>  _Yeah_. That didn't turn out quite like I intended.

The air was rank with the odor of sweat, candle smoke and indignity.

It wasn’t the best scent, and definitely not one Jaime was used to be confronted with after sex.

Or at least not to that extent.

“Is it–“ Brienne rather unnecessarily cleared her throat. “Is it always like that?” Her fingers traced the seam of their shared blanket. Under it lay what Jaime had dreamed of since he followed her back to the North. Maybe even before that, if the dream featuring a naked Brienne and a flammable sword was any indication.

At the moment, most of her bare skin was concealed, but the look of her flesh hadn’t left his memory. The heaving of her small breasts when he had thrust forward for the first time; the freckles on her torso, shaped like a flock of birds, leading to her navel. It was all ingrained in his mind, flashing before his inner eye.

And yet…

“No. It’s not always like that.”

More than twenty years filled with sexual trysts, and now _this_. Cersei had always desired him for his readiness at her command, had even been glad when he hadn’t lasted long in his search for their shared climax. Now he wondered if she had ever found it with him at all.

Because five minutes of rutting was not enough to get a woman to orgasm!

At least that’s what Bronn had jokingly insinuated before Jaime had stolen his bride away ere the vultures cried for a bedding. The briefness of his encounters with Cersei was apparently as much a known fact to the mob as the horrendous end of their dalliance, however that may have happened.

And now he was lying here, next to a woman too good, too kind, too honorable for the likes of him. Lady Brienne Lannister of Tarth deserved more than damnable five minutes and only bloody sheets to show for it.

What she got in the end were _three_ minutes and a coin sized blood stain under her hips. Not to mention all the other fluids.

She had just been so perfect in her soundless gasping and the flutter of her eyelashes when he had told her how much he desired and loved her.

Not being able to hold back was supposed to be a problem of the young, not a seasoned deviant’s. But here he was, the old fucker who had finished in his new wife after _three_ bloody minutes.

The lady in question turned on her side, reaching for his hand. Flat out on his back like he was, it wasn’t hard for her to get a grip on his remaining one.

“How else can it be?” she tentatively asked while he stared at the ceiling.

The humiliation thick on his tongue, he emphatically replied, “Longer, harder, more fulfilling.”

Jaime didn’t wait for the likely kindhearted and undeservedly reassuring answer she surely was about to give him. He half-turned to face her and looked straight into her blue eyes, which – for some reason – were now blown wide. He hurriedly tacked on, “The first time is always tamer, always shorter. I can do better by you.” Lie, lie and wishful thinking.

Brienne’s kiss-roughened mouth fell open. “Truly?” she breathed in the space between them.

“Yes.”

A second later, he had a lap full of very naked wench.

“It can be _even better_?” she euphorically breezed, as high as her naturally deep voice could go. Ignoring his look of shock, she forcefully patted his chest. “Then what are you waiting for?” When she received no other reaction than an incomprehensible gurgle, her pats turned into little slaps.

That got him out of his stasis. Sitting atop him, she looked like a commander about to ride into battle and therefore tried to goad her trusty stallion into a gallop.

Now, who was he to refuse his wife?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote about _heaving breasts_ and fast-shooter Jaime… The C/J sept-scene wasn’t that long *cough* and every bosom can do funny things.  
>  That’s my excuse and I’ll stick to it.


	10. Hand Me Your Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Six moments. Six stages of their relationship.
> 
> (Modern AU, J/B)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After the excitement of the last two ficlets, this one is pretty sedate in comparison. It’s more about the way the story gets told than the story itself.  
> And I tried to challenge myself a bit with it. There are a few, three at least, stylistic and symbolic elements I tried to incorporate.

 

Brienne Tarth wasn’t impressed by her new boss, and even less so the moment the gestures which accompanied Jaime Lannister’s impassioned briefing turned into hand signals that looked a lot like he was flipping the whole management board off – the American, British _and_ Italian way.

<3

Fighting with her annoying boss slash lunch buddy over their shared armrest the day she found herself, purely by accident, sitting next to him in the cinema wasn’t how Brienne had imagined her first day off in weeks to go.

<3

Brienne would lie if she said she wasn’t jaw-dropping surprised when Jaime screamed, “That’s my best friend you're talking about!” while repeatedly smashing his fist into Hyle’s face.

<3

_We got the driver of the truck_ weren’t the soothing words the officer thought them to be since, only one floor down, most of Jaime’s right hand was rotting in the emergency room’s medical waste bin.

<3

The bleeding cut on her finger, a result of her trying to pick up all the pieces of the smashed china at once, didn’t hurt as much as the desolate look on Jaime’s face – finally recognizing that his temper tantrums had the potential to injure her mentally and physically, no matter how small the wound, if he wallowed any longer in self-pity instead of starting to appreciate that she was still by his side despite his behavior.

<3

She wanted to take a sip of her mocha, but Jaime wasn’t ready to give her dominant hand free, now that he finally had the right to hold it to his heart’s content.

 


	11. True Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Who said romance was dead? 
> 
> (Modern AU, J/B)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today I saw heart-shaped cake pops, which reminded me that Valentine's day was like two days ago. This ficlet was planned long before that, but you can see it as a belated V-Day present :P

“I love you.“

“I know,“ Brienne answered without missing a beat. Though, her tone lacked passion.

“You are the sun and moon of my life,” Jaime tried again, this time with a heavy dose of pathos.

“Mhmhm.”

“I can’t even put into words how much I love you. Every single word the dictionary has to offer is too inadequate to express the magnitude of my feelings for you.” His speech was accentuated by a dramatically clenched fist pressed to his heart and a look of yearning that was pretty much wasted on the Brienne-less bedroom wall in front of him.

“Jaime, I’m kind of occupied right now. Save your version of a lover’s oath for later.”

“That truly hurts,” he whimpered, cringing.

“You asked for it.” The faint sound of a bottle being capped accompanied the rebuke.

“I love you,” he whined for the thousandth time, “and yearn for the moment I’ll see your face again.”

Capitulating, Brienne drew back, sighing as Jaime asked again, “Don’t you love me too?” while he craned his neck around to peer at her with a look that bore a startling resemblance to the newly born baby panda at the local zoo.

Brienne stared at him flatly and laid the cosmetic pads full of antiseptic aside. “I just popped a pimple on your back, so big and infected that it deserves a spot as Illness of the Day on _Tarly’s Anatomy_ , because you couldn’t reach it. Does that answer your question?”

He ditched the playfully overdone theatrics and instead a quirky little smile stole across his face. “Yeah,” he grinned, pressing his lips to hers, “it does.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is romantic, damn it!


	12. Siren's Song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The sirens are calling for him.
> 
> (Canon Divergence, myth tie-in)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I haven’t posted a ficlet in about two weeks. The reason? I posted a little standalone fic last week (Fridge Wars). I’m working on some – hah, understatement of the century – a bit longer projects, but I don’t want to leave you high and dry until they are ready, so I’m using my finished ficlets up.  
> This one was written the day after I posted [World on a String](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13391007). While WoaS was Canon/Post, this ficlet is Divergence. But both are mythological tie-ins. I just can’t stop throwing creatures and people of myths and legends into the world of GoT. I mean, it already has dragons, zombies and Frankenstein’s monster…

 

The sailboat held course, like it had for the last few weeks. Nothing would hinder it from reaching its destination. Not even Siren’s Island, a place known for harboring the mythical creatures – half bird, half woman – born to lure men to their death. The few who had escaped them through sheer dumb luck, most of them because they fortunately had a lady unaffected by the foreign magic on board, all told different stories about the sirens' songs. Some said they had heard their wives call for them, a meager handful asserted that it had been the seductive melody of the finest whores clambering for their attention, and others swore, come hell or high water, they had heard people crying for them as if they knew them as heroes and not the lowly fishermen they were.

Therefore, Jaime sucked in a breath when the island’s cliffs came into view, with no chance to skirt around them without losing precious time. He gripped the railing and made a mental tally of the things he always hoped for, to steel himself for the moment the sirens would use his deepest wish to ensnare him.

He was prepared for Cersei telling him in dulcet tones how she loved him, for Tommen and Myrcella calling him father, for a thousand strange voices cheering for Ser Jaime the Just.

“Jaime…”

Ripped out of his musings, he turned to his only companion on the ship. “Yes?” he asked Brienne, who stared at him with troubled eyes. The cuts on her face from their latest run-in with others searching for the Stark girls still hadn’t healed over completely.

She just blinked at him, uncomprehending.

“Jaime…” he heard her sighing again.

Yet, her lips never parted.

He whirled around again. The surface of Siren’s Island was deceivingly green and lush with flora, and evermore trying to bewitch him.

 _“Jaime…”_ the words rode on the wind. “ _My knight, my friend_ ,” Brienne’s voice beckoned, “ _my love_.”

A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.

When Brienne’s callused and warm fingers folded around his shoulder and he caught her voice, concerned and close to his ear, asking, “What do you hear?” he just laid his hand over hers and squeezed. Turning his head to smile at his worried wench, Jaime whispered, “That we have nothing to fear. Reality is more tempting than their song.”


	13. Big Pretenders

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jaime tries to get Brienne to roleplay with him. It's not as innocent or sexy as you might think.
> 
> (Post Canon, cracky)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I finally finished a fic and a few ficlets, but now I'm sitting in the pit of editing-hell, so you get something that I thought I would never publish. Wouldn't want you to think I vanished :P
> 
> OOC (edit: according to some of my readers, not that much) and crack (that's definitely true). Never write at 2 a.m. while thinking about the weirdest shit you ever found on the internet.

“Come on, wench!” he whined, not for the first time.

Brienne whirled around, so energetically she almost knocked the oil lamp beside the bed over. “If you’re that bored with me, if you want _her_ back, then just say so! But don’t pretend it would be _just for fun_ to roleplay,” her voice lost in vigor and volume, “when we both know you just want to imagine her in my stead.” She evaded his eyes, morosely staring out of the night-black window of their rented room.

Jaime waited for a few loaded seconds before he answered.

“Who said that I want _you_ to play her?”

She snorted in response, but at least she looked back at him. “So you want to imagine yourself as your twin while pretending that I’m you? Your narcissism knows no bounds.”

Somehow this seemed funny to him. A widening grin stretched his face as he stalked past her to the bed and let himself fall backwards onto the straw mattress.

“You’re not playing me either,” he thrilled from his new and comfy position.

Brienne’s brow crinkled in thought. “And pray tell me, who are we impersonating in this sexual fantasy of yours?”

One beat, two beats of silence.

“Cersei and Renly.”

Staring at him as if he had grown a second head, or lost the one he at least objectively had, she sputtered, “In what world would Cersei and Renly ever be together?!”

“In a fucked up one?” he shrugged.

She unceremoniously plopped down on the bed and forced Jaime to scoot over in the process, or she would have flattened his knee with her ass. Not that he would have minded that much. But a knee in the ass couldn’t be that comfortable. And at the moment he was all about making Brienne feel good, not the opposite.

“So, my dear wench, what do you say? Me as the queen of darkness, you as the king of cocks?”

If he hadn’t seen the back of her head wiggle the tiniest bit in contemplation while she stared at the spotty wall of their room, he would have thought her frozen in shock.

The next head dip of hers was accompanied by a twist, so that she faced him again.

“To find closure? Like some kind of therapy?” she asked mildly intrigued.

Therapy, that was the word the newest maester of King’s Landing – Sam…well? good? better? best? whatthefuck Tarly – threw around when talking about overcoming the drama and horrors of the past. Jaime was quite sure he hadn’t meant something like this. But he wasn’t going to argue with his wife’s logic.

“Sure, exactly like that.” It probably said a lot about his mental state that he hadn’t even thought about the possibility.

His ever antagonistic, at least when it came to his ideas, wife just had to throw another spanner in the works of his brilliant plan. “You are aware that Renly was not…inclined like your little vision demands. And I can’t emulate a male when it comes to the _mechanics_ of such a union, right?”

Laying his body flat out on the sheets, one arm alluringly stretched over his head, Jaime whispered, his voice gliding into falsetto, “We’re two creative minds. I’m sure we can find a way.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wasn’t even drunk when I wrote this…but boy, do I wish I was.


	14. My Seven Lonely Oceans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The totally realistic and not at all fabricated truth about the _Tarth, Ser Jaime_ -scene.
> 
> (Canon)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And once again I let Jaime grip a ship’s railing. 
> 
> The title is a reference to the lyrics of James Marsters’ song _Bad_.

Enjoying the breeze and tasting a hint of salt on his lips, Jaime tried to tune out the rumpus of ship’s life all around him. He watched waves ripple where their vessel cut through the water and noted that it seemed to get clearer the longer their journey took. Dorne was still a good distance away. Days or weeks, he couldn’t tell. So for now he focused on his surroundings and the simple joy of air, water and landscapes rushing by.

Still, Jaime’s mind was drifting to thoughts of Myrcella, as it should be, since she was the sole reason for this voyage.

Jaime ignored the crew bustling about and their shouts and murmurs alike. Sometimes, one of them would strike up a sea shanty, the others seamlessly joining in, to motivate them to scrub or haul faster. Other times, they would just scream obscenities like expected of their kind. Jaime had learned to block them out when he wasn’t in the mood to throw his own two cents of bawdy jokes in. The song they had started recently was merely background noise. Softer than their usual melodies, it was easy to ignore.

He kept staring at the railing, thinking about how to retrieve his daughter.

 _“My Bonnie lies over the ocean,”_ drifted to his ear without being really heard.

He couldn’t be reckless in his attempt to get Myrcella to go with him.

“ _My Bonnie lies over the sea.”_

His usual rescue plans were rarely without fault. He had to take that into account.

_“My Bonnie lies over the ocean. Oh, bring back my Brienne to me.”_

Myrcella was still just a maiden, naïve and easy to fall in love. Not unlike another young woman he could remember. That plan to save her hadn’t worked out without a hitch either.

_“Bring back, bring back.”_

So long ago, and he still could remember it like it was yesterday.

He tensed his right forearm, from elbow to the place where it ended in nothingness. Totally worth it.

_“Oh, bring back my Brienne to me, to me.”_

How might she have fared since then? He had neither seen her nor heard anything about her exploits since her departure to search for the Stark sisters, a new sword at her side and blue armor on her body.

“ _Bring back, bring back.”_

It had been surprisingly easy to get her measurements right, and the color scheme hadn’t needed further thought put into. Her eyes were astonishingly blue, after all.

He pictured her, clear as day, naked in the bath – all the little nooks and crannies of her body he had only gazed at once and never forgotten, and her eyes shining in rightful indignation.

_“Oh, bring back my Brienne to me.”_

He really missed her.

He sighed wistfully, which woke him up from his trance, and the first thing he saw when he looked up was new land in clear view from the deck. Soft hills of green, round slopes that looked rich in nature and perfect for running wild. And the water around it was bluer than he’d ever seen before.

Frantically trying to locate someone who wasn’t inconspicuously shoving crates around, Jaime finally laid eyes on the captain. Without preamble, he halted the man just going about his business with, “Is that Estermont?” Somehow he couldn’t shake the feeling that he already knew the answer and just made himself look foolish by asking. The captain’s expression of amused disbelief, badly disguised as mild confusion, told him the same. “Tarth, Ser Jaime. The Sapphire Isle.” And with that, he went his way and left Jaime sighing and misty-eyed behind, staring at a neat little island just because it was the wench’s eponymous home.

Having walked to the end of the prow, out of the way, the captain leisurely leaned against a barrel full of probably smuggled goods. “Subtle enough for you?” he asked, holding his palm out, in which Bronn promptly dropped a few shiny coins.

The reinstated sellsword grinned crookedly as he fastened his coin pouch, full with the rest of his advance payment, back to his belt before he stole a look at Lannister, who still gripped the railing with his gaze fixed on a piece of rock like a demented idiot in love.

“Worked well enough. Now let’s get back on course.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is what happened, right?
> 
> ‘My Bonnie lies over the ocean’ is an old famous Scottish folk song that also led to a myriad of remixes, parodies and interpretations.


	15. Better Than a Beetle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Suddenly, everyone’s an art critic. 
> 
> (kiddy!Braime, Modern AU, sequel to "Up and at 'em")

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is set in the same universe as [Up and at ‘em.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12952320/chapters/30349266)
> 
> Let’s rot some teeth.

He slunk closer to her, one little foot before the other, until he stood directly next to Brienne, who was still engrossed in finishing her own picture. They only had five minutes left – that was till the long hand was at the next flower on their clock, they had learned – before art time was over and they had to listen to another reading of Little Red Riding Hood. It was the only story Septa Mordane, instead of Donyse, told them. She said it was to teach them to be wary of strangers. “Beware the wolf in disguise,” she liked to remind them. But even grannies getting eaten became boring over time. So, in silent protest, Brienne was drawing a knight chasing the wolf away. Not that the woman would understand. She had called Brienne’s last attempt to draw a knight in shiny armor a _car_.

A tap on her shoulder made her look up, directly into her best friend’s face. Jaime had been banned to the other side of the classroom after they had stolen away during recess to look at the really big stag beetle Renly said he’d seen behind the janitor’s shed. No sitting together for them as long as they couldn’t be trusted to behave when with each other. Which would mean never sitting together again, like ever. But Septa Donyse had winked at them behind Mordane’s back, so Brienne was pretty sure Jaime would be allowed back before the older septa could say _Once upon a time_.

It looked like that time had arrived. “She’s not angry anymore?” Brienne asked, still lisping – she might have finally grown new front teeth, albeit still tiny, but now the pointy corner one had fallen out.

Jaime’s little face scrunched up. “She is. But Septa Donyse said it’s okay to come over, just for a moment. I have to go back after.”

Brienne peered at the table two places behind her, where her favorite septa was busy telling Oberyn how realistic his drawing of a curled snake looked. Septa Donyse was so much better at understanding their pictures than Mordane.

Putting her black crayon down, Brienne caught Jaime’s eyes again. “After what?”

His cheeks were glowing bright red.

“I just wanted to show you.” Drawing his left hand from behind his back, he held a picture out to her. The white sheet of paper had a gigantic circle on it, and the center was completely filled with blue crayon markings. He had taken care with it, she could tell. He had colored in neat little rows, one blue line next to another, and another, and another, until it was one big blue blob.

“That must have taken so much time,” she smiled. “Are you going to draw the fish now?”

“What?” He seemed confused, then shook his head and went on, “It’s your eye.” He held the paper up and pointed with his free hand at the circle, his finger tracing it once around. Then he almost stuck said finger in her rapidly blinking right eye.

Brienne swatted his hand away. “Why are you drawing my eye? With a pond, you could have drawn ducks and fish. My eyes are boring.” He was her best friend, but sometimes she just didn’t get him. Boys were weird.

Again, he shook his head, so fast he smacked himself in the face with his own ponytail. Spitting some of the hair stuck to his lip out, Jaime forcefully disagreed, “No, they’re not. They’re blue, and big, and my favorite thing to look at.” He grew quieter as he mumbled, “I like them better than the stag beetle.”

Maybe she didn’t understand him all the time, but she understood him well enough to know that he meant it. You didn’t joke about the coolest thing this side of the school fence.

“Thank you!” She graced him with a quick but big smile, uneven and full of gaps, as she stared at the picture still in Jaime’s hands.

When he saw that, he shoved it into hers. “It’s for you. Keep it.”

Mordane was already eyeing him sternly, so he started to slouch back to his seat of shame.

Before he reached it though, he said loudly, “But your teeth are still funny-looking.”

 _Whatever_ , thought Brienne. He liked her eyes enough to draw them, and now she had proof of that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I giggled while writing the wolf parts. Oh, the irony. 
> 
> I hope I was able to make some of you laugh or smile with this ;)


	16. Door Number Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jaime and Brienne asked a few friends for help with their new flat. Only, the married couple is not in sight when Tyrion and Pod get there.
> 
> (Modern AU)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are probably hundreds of fics around that use the same premise. But this one has Tyrion and Podrick in it *jazz hands*

Tyrion and Pod tumbled through the half-open door, knocking a few stacks of still packed boxes over in the process. The teenager’s reflexes were fortunately honed enough from playing basketball with Brienne every Sunday to stop the highest packages from tumbling onto Tyrion’s head.

“It doesn’t look like they even started,” the small man groused and kicked one of the boxes that had tried to assassinate him. Judging from the resulting clattering, he had found the cutlery.

Meanwhile, Pod was giving the room a sweeping glance. High ceiling, a gigantic living room with an open kitchen, and three doors that probably led to the bathroom, sleeping area, and whatever they wanted the third room for. But no trace of the new flat owners. “Do you see them?”

“Not from down here,” Tyrion huffed as he shoved his way through a jungle of still full moving boxes. “Brother Dearest owns me a lot of favors for my assistance in unpacking and organizing this mess.”

Pod helped by shoving a weirdly shaped package out of the other man’s way. “I thought we were promised pizza,” he blinked at the younger Lannister, who just patted him on the knee.

“As charming as that age-old moving tradition is, if you think I’m content with a slice of soggy bread with fake cheese on it, you’re very much mistaken. For _this_ ,” he held a carton with the squiggly black inscription _Jaime’s underwear_ up, “he has to take the blame for me on two occasions I displease father, maybe even more. Which means he’ll have paid his debt somewhere around come Monday.” At Pod’s puzzled look, he elaborated, “I have plans for the weekend.”

That was the moment loud banging started up, seemingly coming from behind one of the doors.

“So, what will it be, Pod? Door number 1, 2 or 3? The big prize is to watch honeymooners trying to assemble an Ikea shelf.”

Before the boy could answer, there was a new sound. Grunting, to be precise.

_“Push harder.”_

Pod mutely pointed at the door in the middle.

Dancing around another illogically strewn around bunch of boxes, Tyrion started toward it.

Only to falter when _“It’s not going to fit!”_ accompanied by loud knocking against the wall could be heard.

With raised eyebrows, Tyrion went for the doorknob.

“Are you sure we should…go in there?” Pod almost whimpered. He had been assigned to Brienne during her stint in the Big Brothers/Big Sisters program. And as her little brother, even if it wasn’t by blood, he had zero interest in barging into an X-rated situation involving her.

 _“It was made for it!”_ Bang. “ _We just need the right position.”_ Thud. Clash. Bang.

Tyrion gestured dramatically at the door. “I’m first in line to let my thoughts stray into the gutter, but when it sounds so ridiculously much like sex, it’s sadly never the case. Not with these two. I fell into that trap a few times.”

“ _The frame will hold.”_

“And there you have proof,” he continued after the groaned exclamation. “It’s just boring,” he opened the door, “old–“ and slammed it shut again.

“So,” he looked up at Pod, still gripping the handle, “I was double-wrong.”

Pod innocently blinked at him.

“They, actually, _are_ christening their new home. And there’s no shelf involved.”

Walking swiftly from the clattered flat, Pod heard Tyrion mumble, a crooked grin on his lips, “Without the mattress on. That’s dedication.”


	17. Eating Dirt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The list of people, boys and men alike, Brienne had knocked into the dust was long...
> 
> (Pre-Canon to Canon)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have three ‘Brienne’s past and her relationships with men’ fics in my folder. This one was just the least stressful to finish. Though it wouldn’t be like it is now without [roqueamadi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/roqueamadi/pseuds/roqueamadi)’s fantastic beta skills!  
> Now, what I lovingly call the 'list'!...thank god I found a better title.

The first time she had pushed a boy into the dust was when she was merely five years old and the smith’s son had called her father a liar because he repeatedly told her she was the prettiest girl in all the kingdoms. That she was more angered about him badmouthing her father than about basically calling her ugly was her only saving grace in the eyes of Septa Roelle when she admonished her for behaving unlike a lady. “Maybe you’re not quite as stupid as you look,” her septa concluded. But Brienne just scuffed her shoes on the cobblestones and thought how good it had felt to make the boy eat dirt for questioning her father’s honor.

The second time was years later, and regrettably only after Ronnet Connigton had already left Evenfall Hall. This one was a squire so inadequate Ser Goodwin was only training him under protest. He’d had to keep him under his tutelage since the lad’s father was a minor lord, but the boy nevertheless got flattened on the training area’s dust-covered ground for belittling girls and ignoring Goodwin’s wisdom. A girl like Brienne, even with her standing, didn’t have any business setting foot in the ring or daring to watch their private training. In contrast to Roelle’s admonition, Goodwin was gleefully patting her on the back and telling the boy, whose mouth was still full of pebbles, straw, and dust, to never underestimate your opponent, no matter what sex, rank or looks they possessed. Making incorrigible boys eat dirt became her favorite pastime from this day on. It definitely trumped making wobbly stitched cushions or pleating her brittle hair.

When she trounced her last fiancé, Humfrey Wagstaff, she was already proficient in the art of dipping boys and men alike in dirt, face first if possible, and nobody was surprised anymore. The people of Tarth were just resigned and disgruntled that this was their future Lady.

Her opponents dwindled over the scant few years that followed. The men around the island knew better than to trifle with her or the few people she held in high regard. And the ones who didn’t know and didn’t care, as foreign as they were, she wasn’t allowed to ram into the mud for breaking her heart. Only after the feast’s end, as her danced-through shoes lay in the corner of her room and she couldn’t feel Renly’s hand in hers anymore, she couldn’t suppress the thought that while her heart still beat in time with the music to which the prince had led her in circles around the ballroom, it maybe would have been even more satisfying to see the others’ faces dirtied by her hand. Maybe it would have kept her insides warmer and her mind at rest for longer than a fleeting moment with a kind man.

She had been right, Brienne found out, when the last knight lay in a heap before her, on the grounds of Bitterbridge. For their prank, their making sport of her virtue and her place among them, they all found a nice little patch of dirt to call their own, thanks to her. Now she reaped what they sowed, getting not only revenge but also Renly’s esteem. The euphoria she kept hidden behind a mask of stoicism would never fade, she was sure of it.

With such a long line of men she had made eat dirt and their own words behind her, she still could only stare disheartened and raging inside as Jaime Lannister’s body hit the ground and his face was pushed into mud and dung, some of it finding its way between his pain-slackened lips. From the moment their journey had started, she had wished to be able to make his snide and cruel words stop with the same technique she had perfected with the string of others like him. And somehow she had achieved it, though it left a bitter taste in her mouth and screams of guilt in her soul, seeing how he was made to eat dirt because of her.


	18. Bones

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How many broken bones does it take to kill you?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is it a poem? Is it (half a) ficlet? No, it’s kind of both! Plus, a moodboard ficlet.

_How many broken bones does it take to kill you?_

_All of them, bellowed Lord Tarly at Renly’s troops._

_Both legs, then you can be easily beheaded, Master Goodwin tended to say._

_One is enough if in the right position, gushed Qyburn._

_None, you know, as Ser Jaime dies in the arms of his sister._

_The heart isn’t a bone, but it still broke._

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I finally found my way into the 21st century. I now have a [tumblr account.](https://sarcasm-for-free.tumblr.com/) If you want to talk or just see what occupies my mind at the moment, hit me up :D


	19. Diggin' Deeper

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two people, a shovel, and wet ground.
> 
> (Modern AU)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Slightly more neutral POV and different style than usual. You’ll see why…

“Keep digging!”

Despite the obvious command, Jaime held the shovel loosely in his right hand, no hint of a desire to take the next delve of spade apparent. His boots were sinking deeper into the earth, which got muddier the longer the heavy rain kept falling. At this time tomorrow, the knee-deep hole he was standing in would be filled to the brim with water.

“Are you deaf? Scoop until I tell you to stop!” Spit was flying while the gun in her hand, the gun pointed at his head, shook with each body-wrecking scream.

Slowly, Jaime bent down to lay the shovel onto the steadily sinking ground. “No.”

“Pick it up!” She came nearer, just a few steps, but was now close enough to get him point-blank between the eyes if she wished to do so.

He didn’t pick the shovel up. Instead, he folded his legs to sit directly in the mud and looked up at her. Rainwater streamed down his face, so he had to blink constantly to not lose sight of her. “We’re here since nightfall. You’re screaming like a banshee. It won’t be long until someone stumbles upon us. And what then? Want to shoot me and shove me into a sad little hole that’s more puddle than grave? Get arrested for this shit stunt? Or do you plan on killing anyone who could be a witness, to leave nobody alive who could rat you out?” He swept wet strings of hair out of his face, sighing. “No matter what you do, it won’t be like you imagined. So why not reschedule? Let’s take a rain check.” He chuckled.

Her hand ceased shaking as she took the last steps to him. When she stopped at the edge of the half finished grave, she pointed her gun down so that the barrel touched his forehead. He wasn’t laughing anymore.

“At the end of this, you’ll have a hole in your head and lie in the dirt. That’s all that matters to me,” she calmly stated. No trace of her previous hysteria shone through.

“It won’t change anything. Your father will still be dead,” he told Daenerys Targaryen.

“Funny,” the slight girl said as her finger tightened around the trigger. “So will you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before anyone screams bloody murder, in the truest sense of the word: This started as a standalone ficlet and then evolved into an idea for a multichapter fic. So I post this here as the oneshot-ficlet it was intended to be – ambiguous ending and all – and when the day comes on which I finish the other parts, it will also serve as a prologue for that ;)
> 
> Long-ass end note, I know, buuut I would like to mention that next week you will see me post more than one non-JB work (fics and other things). It’s [rarepair week!](https://asoiafrarepairs.tumblr.com/) :D After that, I’ll attempt to finally finish more of my over 50 started fics, more than three quarters of them Jaime/Brienne. So stay tuned, and if you want to know more about the progress of my noble quest to get all the fics done, look me up on [tumblr.](https://sarcasm-for-free.tumblr.com/)


	20. Drop It Like It's Hot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _The bass dropped and so did all the booties in the club._  
>  Men talk, women dance, and Jaime's staring at Brienne.
> 
> (Modern AU)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. This is the _guys’_ perspective (there might be the girls’ coming up *cough*), remember that ;)  
>  2\. It’s more Gwen than Brienne. I don’t have to tell you what the inspiration for this was. You all will know what I’m talking about when you read it ;)  
> And 3. I was hell-bent on keeping this one to myself, but roqueamadi thought it was a worthy read and I trust her judgment. So you can thank her for this! :D

The bass dropped and so did all the booties in the club.

“It’s intentional. Female calculation at its finest.”

“Those two, maybe. But Brienne?” Jaime canted his head to the side as if it would help him to make more sense out of the display before him. Shae and Margaery were rubbing on each other in a mix of grinding and twerking, not giving a fig how out of date the move was. Brienne, not even a meter away from them, was in a world of her own, doing what amounted to body rolls and headbanging. It was as if the girls were dancing to different beats.

Tyrion had to raise the volume of his voice to be heard by his brother. “She _is_ a woman, last I checked.”

“On good days.” Jaime was only listening with one ear; the other was poised to pick up the slightest sound of distress from his best friend, who was being danced at by two beefy guys who looked like their parents had fed them steroids since birth. Brienne didn’t even see them, with her eyes closed and head thumping to the music. She was so naïve sometimes, he couldn’t turn off the instinct to protect her from well-muscled, sun-kissed sleazebags with too many teeth. Why the fuck was Fabio grinning at her?

Oh. She did the hip swivel thing again. That’s why.

“Still, an awesome view,” Tyrion hollered from his barstool, the bendy straw of the fruity cocktail Shae had pressured him to order hanging out of his mouth.

“But…we, we shouldn’t stare,” Pod piped up from Tyrion’s other side. Jaime had almost forgotten the lad, drawn in on himself to be as inconspicuous as possible. Well over twenty years old by now and still feeling out of his element wherever he went. Poor guy.

Tyrion swiveled round to the boy and sprinkled his shirt with a few droplets of blue liquid that still clung to the end of the straw. “The whole point is that we’re looking.”

“Not for Brienne,” Jaime deadpanned.

“Of course, not Brienne.”

Jaime boxed his brother in the shoulder, eyes transfixed on Brienne’s wiggly hips. “I can hear your eyes roll.”

“Sounds painful.” Bronn sauntered up to them while pulling up his zipper. “Line in front of the men’s toilets is as long as if every guy suddenly got cystitis. What did I miss?”

He ignored Pod’s kindhearted, “Did you go to the doctor’s with that?” and plopped down on the seat with his jacket.

The song switched to a pop-y number that sounded like the color pink looked. The strobes’ lights cast the girls and every other dancer in neon. Brienne should have looked like a gigantic disco ball, but instead it gave her something fey. Skyscraper-tall, but fey.

“Our girls are trying to make us horny and jealous at the same time,” Tyrion answered.

Bronn chose that moment to whistle through his teeth as Margaery bent almost in half, and Jaime rebuffed Tyrion’s claim. “You are aware that they haven’t so much as glanced in our direction once since they stepped onto the dance floor, right?”

His brother ignored the question, rhetoric as it was, and continued to enjoy the view. Jaime wasn’t as enamored because sleazebag one and sleazebag two had started to inch closer to Brienne. Just when he was about to walk over there, a red flash dashed in between the guys and Brienne.

“Oh, Sansa’s back from the bathroom too,” Pod happily chirped.

Meanwhile on the dance floor, Brienne got play-spanked by Sansa, who was one hundred percent sober, no matter what Marge said, and Jaime suddenly thought he would have preferred Brienne in the middle of a guy-sandwich, because then, at least, he would have been allowed to storm over there.

As it was, he just crossed his arms over his lap and stared resolutely not at Brienne’s ass getting slapped.

There was something hypnotic about it.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *whispers* It's still JAB-June.


	21. Drop It Like It's Hot II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s the girls’ turn to talk.
> 
> (second part of "Drop It Like It's Hot")

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this is obviously long enough to deserve its own separate fic-post, but it started out in this ficlet collection and it will end here (and I’m too lazy to do all that tagging *lol*)  
> 

The music was blearing and Margaery’s behind fit, with not an inch to spare, into Shae’s crotch.

“Is Tyrion still looking?”

“More than looking. He’s slobbering.” Margaery accentuated her laugh with a twerk. “So, what did he do now?”

Shae went on tippy-toes and rested her chin on Marge’s shoulder, pouting. “He was stupid this morning.”

While gyrating a bit more to make their sealed bodies undulate, the taller woman turned her head to the side to peer into Shae’s eyes, laugh-lines crinkling her own. “Isn’t that commonplace for him?”

The guys were in perfect check out direction. Their chairs were facing the dance floor, beaded in a row, their outfits trendy, and their mouths were constantly moving. They reminded her of the community center’s production of _A Chorus Line_.

“He was _especially_ stupid this morning.” Shae’s lips were close enough to Marge’s ear so that she didn’t have to scream over the music to be heard. Not too much, at least. “I casually mentioned that time I was dating Sansa and he told me he was sad he wasn’t there to witness my ‘experimentation’.”

Margaery’s eyebrow rose. “So you’re recreating it, for his viewing pleasure, with me, for as long as Sansa’s peeing her four drinks out?” She grabbed the hand Shae had put on her hip and raised it above their heads to get her turning.

Shae was close-lipped until the pirouette was done, then pressed Margaery closer with both arms slung around her back. “Yes and no.” Her pout was back in full force. “I want to punish him for making it sound like I didn’t know what I like.” She grinded, pelvis to pelvis with her friend. “The plan is to make him horny and leave him sleeping on the couch tonight.”

It seemed to be working so far. At the bar, Tyrion had just put on the universal ‘sex me up’-face of men all over the world. It didn’t make him look smart, that was for sure. The bendy straw dangling out of the corner of his mouth enhanced the impression.

“Not that I’m complaining,” she griped, petting Shae’s ass. Over the girl’s shoulder, it looked like Pod was choking and Tyrion had an aneurysm from sheer joy, their eyes riveted on said petted buttocks. “But I’m pretty sure he didn’t mean it like that. For a diplomat, he has a habit of stepping into sandtraps left and right. It’s Tyrion, after all.”

Spinning them around, so Margaery was, once again, in front of her, Shae scream-whispered in her ear, “That’s why he’s only on the couch for one night.”

From her prime vantage point, which meant ten inch heels and a clear view of the guys, Margaery spotted Jaime boxing his brother. In her peripheral vision, Brienne was doing the snake-move she herself had tried (and failed) to emulate on numerous occasions.

“You’ll have to switch his couch-night to another day. Brienne’s in the zone,” she tilted her head at the blonde dancing next to them. “There will be a different Lannister sleeping on your sofa, wailing about ‘wenches’.”

And he had reason enough to, Margaery noted with a grin. Brienne’s ass looked lovely tonight, thanks to her raiding the girl’s wardrobe to find something suitable for a club. The white little number had been buried under five pairs of jeans and a monstrosity in pink her father had sent her. While jeans were very complementary for Brienne’s legs and behind, it was not material suited for an establishment like _The Moon Door_. She wouldn’t have gotten past the bouncer due to the dress code. And what a shame that would have been, she thought as Brienne undulated, akin to a Dornish belly dancer.

The two rakish bodybuilders next to Brienne seemed to be thinking along the same lines. They were shimmying closer and it caused Jaime to twitch so hard, it looked like a spasm from where Marge turned under Shae’s raised arm.

Her dance partner had seen it too. “Should we help?”

In that moment, Sansa slid in between the strangers and Brienne, in one sinuous move that would have fit into _Risky Business_ and betrayed Sansa’s level of intoxication. The girl was a lightweight.

“No, I think Sansa has the situation in hand,” she smirked, commenting on Sansa spanking Brienne like they were actors in a rap video. All that was missing was a champagne shower.

“Looks like she intends to make it a hat-trick,” Shae smiled into Marge’s neck, to which the other woman sighed, nostalgic, “Oh, those lovely summers in Highgarden,” before breaking into a laugh again.

Opposite of them, the other girls were also caught in a fit of laughter, twisting and turning around each other while Brienne’s unintended background dancers made the impression of deciding between slinking off and taking a chance on a foursome.

“Pod, come dance with us!” Sansa’s enthusiastic screech was so loud, the remix of Madonna’s greatest hits sounded quiet in comparison.

The two adonises took that as their cue to back away. Too much sausage for them, apparently. Wussies.

With the trio now dancing in a roundel to her left, Margaery indicated to her own dance partner that she wanted to take a break. Her Louboutins were marvelous but not made for hours of dancing.

She hobbled up to the bar, in a very dignified way, where she sat herself upon Bronn’s thigh and slipped out of her shoes, letting her feet dangle a few centimeters above the sticky ground. His arms snaked around her waist to stop her from sliding off. “Careful, missy.”

“I don’t really need the help. I’m a pro at sitting on people’s laps, thank you very much,” she chirped and patted the hand on her stomach.

“Yeah, I remember. It’s one of your greatest talents.” She couldn’t see Bronn's lewd grin but it was more than noticeable in his voice, which in turn made her smile to herself. They were currently off, but she gathered they would be official again the instant grandmother got over her newest attempt to set Margaery up with some attorney’s son.

“Give my grandmother three more days and then take me out to dinner.” She gyrated on Bronn’s thigh and raked her nails over the back of his hand.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw how Shae continued her complicated metaphorical dance of turning Tyrion on while simultaneously giving him the cold shoulder. Margaery couldn’t wait to hear how it turned out the next morning at brunch with the girls.

Seeing Jaime brood at the end of the line of guys was a bit of a dampener on Marge’s mood. “Why don’t you get up there and dance with them? I haven’t seen you shaking your hips tonight.” What she meant, of course, was, _Why don’t you, finally, put the moves on Brienne?_   But the two of them were still so skittish about the potential of their obvious big grand love story, so Marge kept that thought to herself.

Jaime squirmed in his seat. For the unobtrusive spectator it might have looked as if his ass was getting numb from the uncomfortable bar stool, but for Marge it was clear: The man had a boner. The reason wasn’t hard to catch either. Brienne’s boisterous laugh could be heard over drums and bass, and Jaime twitched again.

“No, I’m fine. Wouldn’t want to intrude.” He wasn’t overly convincing, with all that focused staring and the quiet sighing going on.

He was good, Marge had to give him that. There was no stutter, no quivering voice, and no hand sneakily put into a trouser pocket. It was pathetic how accustomed he was to hiding his reactions to Brienne.

Nicely buzzed and cuddled by sturdy arms, Marge felt magnanimous. “Fine by me. Gives us the time to talk about the gala on Friday.” He looked confused – good. “Grandmother was adamant that you continue your discussion about the prices of your shipping company or she’s threatening to hire another firm.” His eyebrows drew together and he stopped squirming, with the unease she was accustomed to seeing on people’s faces when her grandmother was mentioned. “Just keep an eye out, she’s not in the best of moods since you increased your fees.” And _there_ was the look of pure panic and the absolute stillness of body she loved to see.

“You know, I think I could do one dance.”

She nodded sagely. “You do that, sweetie.”

And as she watched Jaime approach Brienne, whose face lit up like the disco ball above her head when she saw him, Bronn whispered, husky and raw, “You’re a devious mastermind,” and Margaery concurred.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *listens to "Gettin' bi" in the background*
> 
> This was supposed to be a two-parter. And I would have gotten away with it too, if it weren’t for [roqueamadi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/roqueamadi/pseuds/roqueamadi)! (who also has my never-ending gratitude for working through this with me)  
> Stay tuned for the final part :P


	22. Drop It Like It's Hot III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now that Jaime and Brienne are both, finally, on the dance floor, everything should run smoothly, right? Wrong.
> 
> (third and final part of "Drop It Like It's Hot")

This night was _incredible._

Initially, Brienne had claimed fatigue when Margaery had approached her with her plan for the evening. Clubs were usually not her scene, bad memories and all that. In the end, she had only been won over by the fact that everyone was coming along. That was, as she was well aware, an age-old trick to get hermits to leave their caves, because no one wanted to be the single loser left out (she had enough experience being that loser, so no, thanks, never again if she didn’t have to). Still worked like magic, though.

Now, contorting around her own axis and headbanging, she couldn’t resent Marge for pressing her so hard to leave her heaps of unwashed dishes behind and instead party the night away.

Because, again, this night was incredible.

The DJ had a nice repertoire, containing old-school, pop, and rock songs; nobody had laughed at her dance moves so far – on the contrary – and she was on the right side of buzzed to not care a bit even if someone was snickering behind her back. Not to forget, her friends were in high moods too.

Pod’s hand in her left, Sansa’s in her right, they recreated the Gordian knot with their limbs. Running in a circle while holding hands had, in the end, led to dizziness, so upright Twister it was.

“Is there room for a fourth? If not, I’d like to cut in.”

Jaime’s voice made her look up, and in her bubble of giddiness, she just grinned at him; grinned at her best friend, decked out in casual wear and shiny like a god in neon. However, when she felt a trickle of sweat rolling down her back, she was reminded how she must look, flushed and sweaty, and felt the familiar stirrings of shame. Thankfully, the sangria kicked in, not a second too late, and she remembered that he’d seen her in worse conditions. The Great Gastro Flu Incident of 2017 came to mind.

Before she could pull Jaime into their midst, Pod nodded, wide-eyed but smiling, and danced Sansa a few turns to the right, squirreling her away so they could continue to meld with each other into one big human ball.

Brienne turned to Jaime, hoping to see his typical grin in place to diffuse the awkwardness of having been deserted so fast and left as a twosome. Dancing had never featured into any of their trips and meetings together. Either they would harmonize like a perfectly strung violin, or crash and burn, with a few broken bones thrown in. There really wasn’t middle ground for them, history had taught her.

“So,” Jaime hedged, “dancing?” It was unfair how cute he looked, even when obviously out of his element. Brienne could feel her face crinkle. For someone who came of his own free will, he looked mighty uncomfortable. She threw a look over her shoulder. He had never said for whom he wanted to cut in.

Great. He wanted to dance with Sansa and was instead stranded with her.

Her self-esteem went poof and crawled back into the furthest corner of her being, cowering in close embrace with her cheerfulness that had fucked off as well.

“You know, I think I need a break.” But her attempt to skirt around Jaime and sprint to the bar, into the safety of the group, was hindered by Jaime’s left hand around hers. He hadn’t grabbed her, not pressed fingers around her upper arm or wrist like a lot of men had done when they wanted to keep her in place. He just took her hand, loosely and almost not enough.

“No running away. We’ve never danced together. It’s long past due.” He threw a glance she couldn’t discern at the bar, where Margaery and the others seemed to be playing a drinking game involving a lighter and a banana they’d stolen from the bartender. But since the look lasted only a millisecond, Brienne didn’t question Jaime about it.

Instead, they danced.

Or tried to.

It wasn’t as bad as the usual crash and burn situations, nobody had broken a toe so far, but it was awkward.

So, so awkward.

Brienne bit her lip and stepped from one foot to the other. Gone were her carefree attitude and her acrobatic moves. All she had left in her were box-steps and nodding.

At least it fit Jaime’s swaying back and forth. Drunken mid-teens at a basement party were more coordinated than them and would have made a more compelling picture.

The music drowned out the sigh she could see Jaime heaving but it couldn’t mask the aggregately asked, “What happened to your grace, wench? Or is it reserved for walking boobs and human puppies?”

She overbalanced at his words, but caught herself at the right moment and stopped moving. “I could ask you the same. Where’s the guy who does mixed martial arts in his free time?” She pointedly stared at his locked knees. Flexibility looked different.

He evaded her eyes, choosing to focus on the strobe machine positioned at the wall behind her. “Point taken. And what a good one at that.” Grabbing blindly, he took her right hand in his left. “We obviously went the wrong way about this. Let’s fight, milady.”

Before she could interrupt him, he held his prosthesis up to ward off her unspoken objection. “What I mean is, let’s dance like we fight. We stop thinking that we have to do the rumba or play Snoop Dog and his bitch, or whatever it was Tyrell and Shae were doing, and do our usual thing. What do you say, worth a try?”

“Sounds like a lot of work. Wouldn’t you prefer to snatch a partner with whom you don’t have to put so much effort into for a single dance?” She pointed vaguely with her free hand at the corner in which Sansa was doing the pogo.

Despite the vagueness of her gesture, Jaime caught her meaning. “First, answering a question with another question is bad manners, haven’t you heard? Second, I don’t mind having to work for it, if I deem it for a worthy cause. And third, Sansa’s nice but she’s not the one I _want_ to make that effort for.” His eyes were pinched but trained on her.

Jaime tugged on the fingers still enclosed in his and pulled her as close as he could without smashing their genitals together. “Into fighting position, come on.”

Brienne didn’t know if it was the DJ’s sudden switch from the newest chart hit to _Kung Fu Fighting_ or her inner compulsion to not be outdone by Jaime in anything remotely like martial arts, but the beat ran through her marrow and bones.

Leg tucked up as if for a kick, step back, dodge, turn, ducking under a swinging arm. They ran through every match they ever had, through all the typical moves their muscles had memorized and were recalling right now. And what it amounted to wasn’t teenaged stumbling or a serious fight with the intention to hit a mark. It was perfect harmony in motion.

In one fluid stretch, Brienne bent backwards in half to have Jaime’s forearm whiz above her, and he extended his prosthetic hand in the same second so she could use it to propel herself upwards and spin around him.

As the last melodic fighting scream faded, Brienne became aware of her surroundings again. It was hard not to when thunderous applause echoed in the room. People had stopped their own dancing, had scrambled up to the outer rim of the dance floor, and now were clapping, stomping and whistling. Brienne spied Sansa on Pod’s back, hollering like there was no tomorrow and startling the poor boy with an impulsive kiss on the cheek, as the rest of their group stood on their seats and the bar counter, screaming their lungs out about how awesome Jaime and Brienne were. Her friends were _loud_ and _weird_ , and she loved them even more for that reason, but this was still embarrassing.  

“Oh god,” Brienne half-sighed in horror, half-laughed, ready to bury her face in her hands, but an arm slung around her waist made her face her partner instead.

“None of that bashful hiding,” Jaime murmured close to her ear in the increasing silence, as the ruckus died down and the DJ fumbled with his next track. “We were great.”

She lowered her hands and stared at his profile, illuminated in the still shining disco lights, and stopped trying to suppress her smile. “We’re a good team, occasionally.”

“We could be one permanently.”

Brienne did a double-take. What she saw wasn’t an over-bright grin or an elbow poised for a comradely nudge in the ribs to get in on the joke.

The hand on her hip still wasn’t constricting or pressing. It lay gentle and caressing, and was ultimately what made her understand the seriousness of his suggestion.

As the first notes of a slow number blared through the loudspeakers, Brienne turned around in Jaime’s arms, and smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First, I wanted them to dance like they fence, but then I watched fencing videos and the resulting dance would have looked like an angry crotch-kicking tango, so I changed my mind. Now, it looks like the dance party scene in ATLA. You’re welcome :P
> 
> Thanks, thanks, and even more thanks go to [roqueamadi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/roqueamadi/pseuds/roqueamadi) for all her help with this.
> 
> Comments, kudos, and bookmarks (logged in or anonymous), or if you want to talk to me via [tumblr](https://sarcasm-for-free.tumblr.com/), are all appreciated and will make my day. I can guarantee you that ;)


	23. The Second Season

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The sun never stopped shining these days.
> 
> (Post-Canon)

When the frost thawed and the blanket of snow melted from the land, the people of Westeros jubilated. The undead were defeated and therefore the eternal seeming winter came to an end.

When the temperature rose, and the flora and fauna came back to life after having been strangled by ice for far too long, they saw it as a reason to feast and dance and be merry.

When the weather’s pleasantness increased and the sun never stopped shining down on them, they thought the gods wanted to bestow a gift on them for their resilience.

When the shine of the sun became a constant burn, the farmers started to fear for their crops.

Only when the first knight dropped dead, boiled in his own armor, at a tourney to celebrate the new world, the rest of the people began to worry. Jaime Lannister all but ordered his wife to strip out of her breastplate and vambraces.

The heat still went up and decorum slowly became a second thought to the populace. Metal couldn’t be strapped to bodies anymore without branding its owners in the process. Boiled leather and linen became the reason for rashes and unimaginable stink, cooking their wearers in their own juices. Dornish and Highgarden fashion became the norm wherever you went. There wasn’t an alternative.

The ecstasy of seeing drops of sweat running down Brienne’s collarbones and into the valley of her small but exceptionally well displayed breasts lost its appeal fast for her husband. With everyone’s skin reddened and cracking and the odor of the streets akin to that of a full lavvy, there wasn’t a single lustful thought on anyone’s mind.

When the people from all over Westeros started to migrate to the North, led by Lord and Lady Lannister, only to find arid ground, dead animals that were not made for anything but the cold, and houses and castles like burning furnaces, equipped to keep heat in and not out, they saw the error of their hopes.

The gods weren’t celebrating their triumph. They sought to install balance.

A long, sheer never-ending winter needed a counterpart – a never-ending summer.

As Brienne and Jaime drifted off, their blistered fingers interlaced and their naked skin fused together, the birds stopped singing.

Summer would never end for the likes of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Art imitates life.


	24. DirtyNastyWrong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _It’s dirty, girl. Fluids, blood, sweat – the beast with two backs is nasty to meet._
> 
>  
> 
> (Canon/Post-Canon)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I found this little ficlet buried in my _finished_ -folder. The file tells me it’s so old, it’s probably the first or second J/B thing I ever wrote. I can’t even remember what I wanted it to look like – what my vision was *lol* – but apparently, I was totally into stylistic repetition back then (as I’m today ;))
> 
> Have fun! xD

_Dirty. Nasty. Wrong_. These were the words Septa Roelle used, day in, day out, to describe what took place in martial beds.

 _It’s dirty, girl. Fluids, blood, sweat – the beast with two backs is nasty to meet. Wrong in the eyes of the Seven, that’s what it is but what women have to endure_. Brienne’s septa had told her this on her seventh birthday. Nowadays, Brienne was pretty sure her chaperon had been utterly drunk when she had hissed her monologue into the impressionable ears of a girl playing with her dollies and giggling about meeting her betrothed.

Yet, the words stayed with her. Stayed with her while she learned to use the sword. ( _Walk along this path, child, and no one will want you to bloody their sheets._ ) Stayed with her as a rose landed at her feet. ( _A sow, how fitting._ )  Stayed with her when she danced tear-faced with a Baratheon. ( _You’ll find truth in your looking glass, not on the tongues of men_.)

And they stayed with her through everything after – miles of land and sea between the septa and her, but never leaving the words behind. There was no blocking out the whispers in her mind when there were bets placed on eventual blood between her thighs ( _Dirty_ ). Not when she was towing a prisoner through Westeros that talked of men doing despicable things to her ( _Nasty_ ). Not when she got threatened with the very same thing in the most horrible way possible ( _Wrong_ ).

The words of her septa were a constant buzz in her head when faced with men, and thoughts spoken in the old woman’s distinct voice followed her everywhere. Brienne would have thought herself under the influence of magic, intended to drive her slowly mad, but she had seen too much _real_ magic to put much stock into the idea of someone taking the time to curse _her_.

She lived through it all. And today of all days, the feeling of being hexed should have vanished into thin air, because if there ever was something in this wretched world that showed that one was not cursed, it was the privilege to marry for love.

But while her dress was white, all she could think of was getting it bloody. While her shoes were high heeled, all she could think about was running away. While her new husband was Jaime Lannister, all she was able to feel in that moment was _DirtyNastyWrong_. The bedding was near.

With wine on her tongue and jeering behind their backs as they left the feast on their own, her panic flowed and ebbed in constant waves. Jaime’s left hand was steadfast in her right; his smile intended to sooth her frayed nerves.

A dropped dress pooling at her feet later, the screaming in her head took up again and swallowed every thought.

 _Dirty_ – he pulled her smallclothes down.

 _Nasty_ – he fumbled, one-handed, with the laces of his trousers, smiling the moment they finally loosened.

But the wail of _Wrong_ broke in half as his lips touched hers, a smile still on them, and he simply asked, “Brienne?” The _yes_ she uttered was so small, it shouldn’t have been able to drown out the litany Septa Roelle’s echo bellowed at her, but it worked as if she’d screamed it.

She heard the bitter woman’s vitriol for the last time. The hateful taunts ebbed away, once Jaime forwent to thrust into her to satisfy his own urges and instead chose to prepare and pleasure her, hand, mouth and eyes set on her.

As his fingers curled in her and his tongue curled around hers, her toes curled in the sheets. It seemed there was a lot of curling involved in the act. Roelle hadn’t mentioned _that_. But Brienne wasn’t surprised.

Her septa had obviously neither understood nor known anything about life or love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is kind of the antithesis to my previously posted (but actually ‘newer’) JB-doing-it-for-the-first-time ficlet “Not Like You Imagined”. A totally different aspect pushed into the spotlight :P
> 
> If you need more sugar from mama, maybe my latest mini-fic [Doggy Style](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15979118%22) can tide you over until I have the time to finish another story.
> 
> Thanks for reading! :)


	25. Mr. Idea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jaime has lots of ideas.  
> Their _quality_ is a totally different matter.
> 
> (Modern AU)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> JB Week came, went, and I did nothing.  
> I’m swamped with real life obligations at the moment and it pretty much curbed my energy to read or write, which sadly made me miss out on all the fun :(  
> But I’m trying to get into it again, so here, have a silly ficlet :D

 

“Believe me, this will be phenomenal.”

Brienne eyed the hobby-horse in her hand and the blow dryer in Jaime’s. “You sure about that?”

Turned out he was right, after a fashion.

It was a phenomenal catastrophe.

*

Dragging her sogging wet self to the shore, Brienne spared a glance at an equally bedraggled looking Jaime, who played starfish on the sandy ground. He was not appropriately abashed about the situation he’d shoved them in, in her opinion.

“Is that how you planned this to go?” she questioned the sand-smeared form at her feet.

“No, can’t say it is,” he grinned at her while flapping his arms and therefore making the beach equivalent of a snow angel.

Brienne felt it was the perfect time to facepalm.

*

She would like to pretend she’d learned from these instances, but sadly, Jaime just had to bat his unfairly long eyelashes at her and tell her how she was his truest friend, and bam, here she was again – stuck in the escape hatch of an elevator while Jaime tugged at her legs and a peacock strutted around the lift.

She hoped, desperately, she would learn someday.

*

That day was not today.

“Everything was fine until Aunt Genna turned up.”

Grinding her teeth, Brienne nodded slowly, her eyebrows meeting her hairline.

Jaime put his face in her field of vision. “Come on, it wasn’t a total bust. For example, this dress gives me a certain _je ne sais quoi_.” He emphasized his statement with a swish of the green taffeta dress’ skirts.

Brienne was sure she was tasting blood as she bit her tongue. “Uh-huh.”

“Don’t look so grim. You’re filling out that tuxedo like it was made for you,” he goaded her.

Looking down at her polished brogue shoes, Brienne started to count to ten.

1, 2, 3, 4–

“My, would you look at these shoulders.” He moved his arms to indicate the width of the mentioned body part, and she instantly wanted to box through the open space between his hands. His nose made for a wonderful target.

Deep breath in, deep breath out.

5, 6, 7–

“Don’t go Hulk on me. I would be sad to see these nice sleeves burst.”

In her defense, she didn’t punch him.

She only kicked him in the shin.

*

“I have an idea.”

More fear inducing words had never been spoken.

“It’s my best one to date.”

Correction: _That_ was the scariest thing Brienne had ever heard.

She scooted to the edge of her bed, ready to flee, since she had the unfortunate penchant for letting herself get wrestled into stuff by him – often quite literally. If it wasn’t the stupidly pretty eyelashes, it was the scent of his deodorant and the sighed _Brienne_ that did her in.

“ _No._ ” She scrambled to the side and almost tipped over the edge and onto her carpet as he plopped down next to her.

“Hear me out, Brienne.”

He did his shtick with the fluttery eyelashes again, yet this time Brienne wasn’t letting herself be swayed by it. It seemed like the day she wasn’t going to fall for it had finally arrived.

“You’re my best friend since forever. We’re inseparable. JaimeandBrienne.” And there went her resolve.

Brienne huffed and flopped backwards onto the bed, closing her eyes in defeat. “Fine. What do you want me to do this time?”

She felt the mattress dip and envisioned how he appraised her, searching for the best angle to plead his case.

“Lying still. And if it goes well, reciprocation would be nice.”

What?

Before she could repeat the question aloud, she had a pair of dry but soft lips pressed to hers.

She snapped her eyes open, and saw herself confronted with the most blessed-out expression she’d ever witnessed on Jaime Lannister. She went a bit cross-eyed the longer she focused on the face only millimeters away from hers, but it was worth it.

With the feeling of awkwardness long gone – after she’d jumped over her shadow and did as he’d hoped – their mouths parted but stayed close. The air between them became moist and hot and not as ridiculously uncomfortable as Brienne had feared when she’d fantasized about the magical marvel of a first kiss.

 “Definitely my greatest idea,” Jaime breathed.

 “The _best_ ,” she had to agree.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I stand by it: Jaime Lannister is horrible at planning. (Charging a dragon with a stick? Grade A plan, buddy.)  
> But even a broken clock is right twice a day, as we can see ;)
> 
> Comments, kudos, bookmarks and subscriptions are life!


	26. Three Hands and Two Hearts for One Baby

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The baby’s finally here, but Jaime is an insecure idiot, in his wife’s opinion. _“Just hold your daughter.”_
> 
> (Modern AU, parents!Braime)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What started as two snippets ([Preschool, Day 1](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12952320/chapters/29762235) and [Mommy is a Star](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12952320/chapters/30499353)) branched out and led to, as of today, 8 ficlets which all feature the same universe. Because it consists of vignettes that are not always chronological, they will still be posted in this ficlet-collection.
> 
> Roqueamadi, who probably can’t remember since it was so long ago, urged me to use something I said as a tag line. Now it’s the title of this ficlet and the reason why my parents!Braime-universe is called **3, 2, 1 – Parents!** ;)

“I shouldn’t.” Jaime’s voice was faint, but it still reverberated in the otherwise silent hospital room.

Brienne sighed. “Just hold your daughter.”

“They have these self-destruction buttons.” Jaime vaguely pointed at his own head to outline the area of a baby’s fontanel. “And I’m short a part of the necessary equipment for a safe hold. If I still had two hands–” he trailed off and evaded her eyes by focusing on the oversized painting of a dandelion that hung next to her bed.

“Don’t even try that tactic. You saved your nephew and lost a hand. But he’s alive and you’re alive, so shut up and hold your daughter,” Brienne said before she resumed pressing her lips so hard together they almost turned white.

He wasn’t completely over the loss of his right hand. It had only happened half a year ago, after all. The scars on the end of his wrist were, to this day, tender, red and raised.

It was a ready-made excuse, and Brienne was done letting him get away with it. If the baby had been a book, pen or dust mop, Brienne would have shaken it in his direction at this point in the discussion. Since it was neither, she just stroked the downy hair on the child’s head, which peeked out from the blanket, and looked at Jaime with mounting exasperation.

“Do you want me to believe you didn’t google-fu the hell out of ways to make it work?”

He helplessly displayed his stump.

Brienne rolled her eyes. “Since _February_ , all of YouTube’s video recommendations for me were tutorials about ‘How to hold your newborn with one hand’, and that’s not because _I_ watched them religiously.” For that reason alone she could no longer suppress a smile and nodded at the scrunchy face encased in a swaddle of green cloth.

“Hold your daughter, Jaime.”

So he did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you haven’t seen it or are in the mood for something chilling after all this fluff, I posted a fic last week. Fitting for Halloween, it’s in the style of classic horror movies. And don’t worry, [ Cersei](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16471487) is, despite the title, definitely a J/B story ;)


	27. Bathroom Blues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You don’t have much time to yourself when you have a baby. Not even to pee.
> 
> (Modern AU, parents!Braime)
> 
> Another snippet for my "3, 2, 1 – Parents!" universe. But you can also read it on its own :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't have kids, but damn, do I love writing about them.

Soft-footed, Brienne tiptoed to the door, her eyes on the crib where her daughter had, at last, decided to take her long overdue nap. Whoever had said that babies slept most of the time had never met Aggy.

Five renditions of her favorite lullaby and half an hour on the rocking chair to sway her to sleep had put a strain on Brienne’s nerves. And on her bladder. The baby might be out of her womb, but a few of the pregnancy “perks” had stayed.

With the door closed behind her, she raced in her fluffy socks to the bathroom, slithered into the room and unceremoniously dropped her jogging pants to plop down onto the toilet seat. Which was, of course, when her bladder decided to play shy. Finally at the finish line and the traitor clammed up, twisting her insides in agony. Typical.

“ _It’s getting wet in here, so take off all your clothes,”_ warbled through the rush of running water and the clatter in her head. She’d forgotten Jaime wanted to wash up after Aggy had puked on him and his new sweater.

“What are you singing?”

Steam billowed over the top of the shower. “Would you prefer that I use this as my shower theme?” Jaime answered, followed by the stabby noises from _Psycho_.

Strangely enough, that was what got her fluids flowing. Brienne involuntary sighed, and then stopped in sudden epiphany. “The romance in our relationship is officially dead.”

Jaime pulled back the curtain and poked only his head out so he didn’t flood the bathroom with the water spray behind him. “Why?” he asked with arched eyebrows.

Brienne kept silent, just looked pointedly at the shower and then swept her gaze down – from her lower body on the toilet to the dropped cotton panties pooling around her feet.

Jaime laughed. “If you think doing your business while I’m showering has any effect on my feelings or libido when it comes to you, darling, you're in for a surprise. I saw you press out a baby through that little joy-place of yours. And if the re-enactment of _Alien_ didn’t quench my lust for you, nothing will.”

His wife bestowed her most menacing glare on him, but Jaime simply grinned in the face of such grumpiness and chirped, while closing the curtain, “That would be more intimidating if you weren’t peeing.”

Which she did.

For the whole five seconds before Aggy woke up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I outdid myself with references to movies and songs in this one, but I’m such a sucker for them xD


	28. A Thousand Words

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A thousand words wouldn’t be enough to describe Brienne…
> 
> (Canon or Modern, whatever you want it to be)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shortest ficlet ever, but today’s the day tumblr kills its userbase and so I protest by being active everywhere else.

A thousand words wouldn’t be enough to describe Brienne like she deserved, Jaime told her before he began his alphabetical list with **_A_** _llegiant_ , because he was sure **_A_** _ggravatingly gullible_ would earn him a night on the inn’s floor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bigger fics are coming, probably in the new year.


End file.
